Destiny of the Scots-Irish: A Family Saga

Destiny
of the Scots-Irish: A Family Saga

Amid the
unfolding events in American history, perhaps no race can offer the same
nostalgic appeal as the Scots-Irish. These God-fearing, family-oriented, hard-
working, nomadic people, who originated in the lowlands of Scotland and moved
to the north of Ireland, arrived on the American shores in great numbers prior
to the American Revolutionary War.

Detested in
Pennsylvania by the Quakers, they fanned out and quickly sifted like
wind-strewn thistle westward and southward into the American back country.

Destiny of
the Scots-Irish: A Family Saga chronicles the migratory path taken by one
family that settled in the extremely significant, Scots-Irish Long Canes
settlement in South Carolina.

A single
member of each generation is brought into play to carry the family saga
forward, beginning with Nancy Patton who rode a horse hundreds of miles from
Virginia determinedly to establish her roots in the South Carolina Long Canes.

The
tremendously interesting cast of characters weaves a heart-moving story through
planting of their family roots, the ravages of war, the lush antebellum era, a
world turned upside down by the Civil War, founding of the little town of
Willington, SC, plagues and depression, and out migration – families in joy,
peace, and strife.

Bob Edmonds is a writer well versed in the historical setting of the eighteenth century immigrants. Bob’s accomplishments as an authour are widely acclaimed and this latest work on a Scots-Irish family of that period will considerably add to his reputation in the local history literary field.

... an insight into the home of the Scots-Irish family in America and the bonds of family life – adapting to life in America while maintaining the old ways of Scotland and Ireland even unto the present time. Well worth the time to read!

— CONSTANCE TIMMERMAN MCNEILL, ED. D., OEDGS

Bob Edmonds has utilized his extensive knowledge in weaving the stories of a Scots- Irish family who settled in the Long Canes area before the Revolutionary war and whose descendants were instrumental in the establishment of the town of Willington, which emerged as an agricultural-mercantile center in the 1890s and declined with the collapse of South Carolina’s cotton economy in the 1930s.

— DR. ALLEN STOKES, Director, South Carolinian Library, The University of South Carolina

Bob Edmonds has a special knack for listening and an aptitude for writing and photography. McCormick County Land of Cotton explores the cotton kingdom and its environs.